My nose is now officially rated to better than .6 parts per whichever measure the gas company's using, 'cos that turned out to be the concentration seeping around the water-heater's pilot valve knob when I caught a whiff of mercaptan right after I woke up and decided it warranted Panic. (I mean, it took the gas guy two passes with his gadget to find the source.) They say it's not dangerous in the grand scheme of Potential ASSSPLODEYNESS, so onto the list of unresolvable garden-apartment nuisances it goes... {sigh} Not crazy for thinking I was smelling something, at least. If I had money I would so be putting in a tankless so fast it'd make your head spin...

That stuff was deliberately put in gas BECAUSE humans can smell such small amounts. Glad it wasn't anything esplody, but you really should get it fixed ASAP because leaks can get worse and your nose can get accustomed to the smell.

I grilled the guy, but apparently it's not so much a leak proper as an issue of the design of the valve itself --trace amounts are seeping out through/around the lubricant of the knob that twiddles "off/pilot/on", which supposedly is just the way the damn thing has to work. Very much want a tankless or something that doesn't depend on a pilot-light arrangement, if everything else can be electric-ignition why not that... {sigh}